Distances are big. Traffic is dense and slow and thank god it's bikes, because the roads could not handle the same number of cars. They say it's over 4 million motorbikes and only 500.000 cars.

Public transport is chaotic. The Government is trying to get bikes out of the road by designing new routes, although Vietnamese see their bike as their means of freedom. Transport is somehow privatised (strange in a Communist country...) and more than 30 bus companies are receiving subsidies that try to make services attractive, but are still leading the companies into hard times. There are in excess of 2,500 buses serving more than 115 routes through the different districts in Ho Chi Minh City as well as the nearby boroughs of Dong Nai, Binh Duong, Tay Ninh and Long An.

Ticket cost is extremely cheap (for a European mind). It's only 3000 Dong for less than 12km. (25000 Dong in 1 Euro). For trips over 12 kms, the price doubles. Working hours for buses are rather strange: from 5am to 8 pm.

Route 32 is operated by Xy Buýt Citranco, (City Transport Company, Ltd) part of the Saigon Bus Group with small 24 seater Hyundai microbuses. It runs every 10 minutes and due to its suburbial route and the narrow streets it needs to drive through, justifies the use of such small buses.

Out of curiosity, the company was granted a prize when they placed the Communist youth Union logo on all sizes of their buses, as well as in the driver's uniform. The company owns around 100 buses.

Toronto, the biggest city in Canada, but not its capital, is over 2.5 million inhabitants, it's the country's financial centre. When we talk about Greater Toronto, the population doubles.

As any typical city in the North of the American Continent, it has a downtown, where you can see the highest skyscrapers (also the famous landmark Tower CN with 553 metres high next to the Rogers Centre). The rest of the city expands widely around it.

Public Transport is operated by TTC, offering a wide selection of buses, trams (streetcars) and underground. According the statistics, the system is the third most used system within North America, preceded by New York and Mexico City.

The company has more than 1700 buses, 240 trams and 700 underground trains that operate the 139 bus routes, 11 streetcar lines and 4 metro services. By end of 2009, 40% of the fleet will be hybrid vehicles, with a clear bet to save the environment. By 2010, all vehicles will have a bike rack (for two bicycles) at the front, as the picture of the 32C clearly shows.

Out of curiosity, TTC's website shows that the most commonly used service is bus route 29 to Dufferin with around 43,600 passengers per day and streetcar line 504 King, carrying 56,700 users on a workday.The 32 service is actually 5 routes along the same corridor. The 32 Eglinton West bus route operates between Eglinton Station on the Yonge-University-Spadina Subway, the area of Eglinton Avenue West and Renforth Drive, and the Airport Corporate Centre in the City of Mississauga, generally in an east-west direction. The TTC website has a dedicated page for each line. Please check the one on the 32.